Talking to the IT industry about websites feels a little like teaching your grandma to suck eggs. After all, digital technology is your day-to-day. But while you probably have the technical side covered, how is your tech company website performing when it comes to connecting with your audience – and delivering a return on investment for your brand?
Marketing for tech companies is a tricky proposition: there is a fine line between clearly explaining the features of a product or solution, and overcomplicating the user experience.
When you are dealing with complex concepts every day, it’s often hard to translate the unique selling points of your offering into clear concepts that your customers understand, creating a desire amongst the target market to engage with your website and your brand.
It’s different for every company, but the best tech websites walk this line like a pro. How? By understanding exactly who their target audience is, the language they respond best to, what makes them tick, and how their software product can alleviate their pain points. If you have a clear idea of all this, all that remains is to translate that understanding into technology marketing and website content that speaks directly to ‘your people’.
So, what are the key ingredients for an effective tech company website? Let’s take a look at five ways to revamp your website DNA to make your marketing more effective. Creating a website strategy based on these steps will lead to a greater understanding of your brand, higher levels of engagement and, ultimately, more sales or subscriptions.
The way you talk about your tech really matters. How you do this will depend on what your customers need – but also how they feel. If you can connect on this very human level, you’re well on the way towards a website brand personality that really clicks with your clients.
One of the best tech websites to do this is the Asana site. Instead of listing overly-technical details, the homepage showcases how the company understands the problem their customers are facing and proposes a solution – all in a single, short sentence.
“You’ve arrived at the central place for work—add team members, drop your work in Asana, start collaborating. Yep, it’s that easy.” – Asana
Who are the people your tech company website is speaking to? Have them firmly in your mind’s eye, so you can communicate to them at the right level. Is your site using technical language that your audience just doesn’t get? If so, you’re not going to capture their interest.
If you’re a B2B company catering for specialist clients, it’s good to portray the brand and the team as experts in their field – in which case, you won’t want to play down your technical credentials. But you will want to ensure that what you say is in tune with your customers’ needs.
On the other hand, if you’re trying to sell software as a service to office workers, the words and design concepts you use will be different. Rafflecopter is a great example of a B2C tech company website that goes to great lengths to demystify the tech and keep things light, so it’s not intimidating for a general audience.
“Whether your giveaway attracts hundreds of entries or hundreds of thousands, Rafflecopter has the technology to help you go the distance. For years, our platform has been trusted daily by some of the biggest names on the web, along with hundreds of thousands of smaller sites all over the world. You’re in good hands.” – Rafflecopter
Although your products may be complex, as an IT or SaaS company, you exist to make things easier for your customers. Sometimes it takes an outsider to ask the questions that may seem obvious to your developers – so it can be useful to do a bit of market research to see exactly how easy your product is to understand.
And when it comes to visual communication, infographics, illustrations and animation (such as the graphics on the Docusign website) can all be great tools to get those big ideas across.
When it’s part of your day job, it’s easy to forget that your website is a means to an end. People visiting your site aren’t there for fun: they want to get something done, whether that’s research your product, download a trial version or get in touch for more information. So when you’re developing your website, using the right CTA (call to action) in the right place at the right time is fundamentally important.
There’s no point in being subtle. Your website structure and design elements (think big, prominent buttons and clear, uncluttered screens) should signpost your users at every opportunity, so you have a simple user journey leading to those all-important endpoints. You want to make sure that people can find the solutions they need, and quickly.
Looking for inspiration? Achievers is a tech company website that does a great job of nurturing the user through a funnel to book a demo.
Marketing for tech companies often includes lead magnets such as a downloadable whitepaper, educational webinar or free, time-limited trial. But are you making the most of these resources? Think about what you could offer to really add value to your target audience: Todoist does a great line in document templates, for example.
If you already have lead magnets in place, audit your website to ensure that you are capturing contact information for people who download your assets – these are really valuable prospects who are clearly interested in what you offer. Make sure you have clear, enticing calls to action that are easy to follow through – so there’s nothing standing in the way of those all-important conversions.
Here at Wagada Digital, we specialise in marketing for software companies. If you’re looking for a website strategy to put you up there with the best tech websites, get in touch. We’d love to hear from you!
Alternatively, if you’re unsure where to begin when it comes to digital marketing strategy, don’t worry, we’ve done the hard work for you! This guide is designed to break down the ins and outs of digital marketing.
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